Tony folds the letter and pockets it. ‘He gave me a mission.’ Tony turns his soft brown eyes on me. ‘I’m to watch over you.’
He doesn’t look away this time so I hold his gaze, remembering the feel of his fingers on my skin. Either he can read my mind or he’s thinking the same thing, because Tony’s face flushes poppy red.
Gigi covers my eyes with her hand. ‘You and Tony clearly need more alone time.’
Yue Gui stands. ‘Our next steps are clear. We’ll send a message to House Durand, stipulating the conditions of our assistance. Feel free to explore the house and our gardens but please do not venture outside the wards for now. Lunch will be served in about an hour.’
Twenty-Two
Messages
Marianne returns home from tailing Max to find a delivery boy shifting nervously from one foot to another, frowning intently at the dark green gates of Mémère’s hôtel particulier.
Marianne stops beside him. ‘Can I help you?’
‘Ah, oui, mademoiselle,’ the boy says. ‘I have an urgent message for House Durand. But there is no bell, and I’ve been knocking for five minutes now.’
‘I’ll take it in,’ she says.
The boy glances at her then at the locked gate. ‘But, I am to deliver only to House Durand. How can I be sure you are a resident here?’
Marianne swallows her irritation. The boy’s blood sings to her. She really must get inside and pour herself a glass of sangue. Trying not to sigh, she pulls a heavy iron key from her pocket and unlocks the gate with a loudclang.
‘Will that do?’
‘Merci, mademoiselle.’ The boy hands her a pale blue envelope he’s fished out of his messenger bag before heading to his moped parked across the street.
Mémère sits in her usual spot by the window, a teacup on a small table at her right elbow, a larger table on her left, covered in jars of water, scrap paper, a mottled multicoloured rag, and a large flower-shaped ceramic palette, as mottled and multicoloured as the rag. Once there were two easels, side by side, but Papa’s easel was put away a long time ago.
Marianne can’t see the canvas from the door, but it doesn’t matter. The subject of Mémère’s portraits is always the same: Papa.
Mémère’s watercolours capture detail and emotion as perfectly as a photograph. The paintings of Papa laughing were Marianne’s favourites, but their verisimilitude made each portrait a stinging slap of grief. Eventually Marianne could no longer bring herself to look at them.
Mémère carefully mixes her colours and lifts brush to canvas, painting with deft strokes. Marianne approaches, about to set down the envelope when she glimpses the canvas.
For the first time in nearly a hundred years, Mémère’s subject is not Papa. The shape of the face, the colouring, the hair... she is painting Jing.
Without interrupting her work, Mémère asks, ‘Did you find Maximilien?’
Before, Marianne would have been overjoyed by her grandmother’s agreeable tone. A tone devoid of reproach for being tardy, a tone with a notable absence of withering commentary regarding the unhealthiness of walking in the sunshine, a tone which, for once, was not sharp, impatient, or overly critical. And yet.
‘Yes. I followed him to Maison Loo, but Max couldn’t breach their wards. He’s in Bar 228 indulging in his pursuivants.’
Marianne is pleased and disappointed in equal measure. Pleased that her brother was thwarted. And disappointed by his rash actions. He could have ruined the precious little goodwill they managed to earn.
Mémère’s lips tighten briefly. ‘I shall have a long talk with Maximilien.’
Marianne nods, though she isn’t as confident as Mémère that Maximilien will listen. What if this foundling is another Maximilien, as entitled and petty? The very notion exhausts her.She resolves not to think on it. What sort of character her sister has is out of her control.On fait ce qu’on doit, advienne que pourra.
Mémère gestures at the envelope dangling from Marianne’s fingers. ‘Read it for me.’
Marianne tucks her legs under her and sinks into an armchair where she can see her grandmother, but not the painting. ‘We could have missed the missive. The boy said he’d been waiting a while.’
Mémère’s brush pauses briefly. ‘I scented the boy long before he knocked on the gate. And I knew you were right behind him. If we had a bell, outsiders would feel entitled to call on us. And I might feel entitled to taste them.’
Marianne knows her grandmother would never deign to drink from anyone but her loyal pursuivants so plays along. ‘Oui, Mémère.’
Her grandmother picks up another brush. She inspects the tip before mixing a new colour on the palette. Holding brush to paper, the delicate bristles hover a hair’s breadth from the canvas. ‘The letter,’ Mémère says with a hint of impatience.
